Allchorn Blog

Yes, you can. You can use yourname@yourdomain.com while using the gmail interface.

Here’s how…

1. Go to Gmail.com and sign up for a new account. Use whatever name you like, but preferably one relating to you and one you’ll remember. Use your current work email address as the secondary account (joe@joeblogs.com).
2. Click on “I’m ready, show me my account”.
3. Click on “settings” at the top right of the window.
4. Click on the “Accounts” tab in the main content area.
5. Click on “Add another email address you own”.
6. Make sure your name is correct and put your primary email address (joe@joeblogs.com) into the email address field and click “Next step”.
7. Click on “Send verification”.
8. Check your main email and copy/paste the code supplied into the field waiting and click “Verify”.
9. Now you have 2 email accounts showing. Click on “make default” next to your work account.
10. Click on “Compose Mail” on the left, and send an email to your work account. It should come directly to your gmail interface, and from your work account.

You’re done… give yourself a pat on your back.

If you’re wondering why someone would do this then you’ve either never used the gmail interface, or you don’t like the way it works.

I have been working like this for a good few months now. I can check my email from any device from anywhere. I occasionally download all my mail into Thunderbird to keep a backup, but on a whole, I’m embracing the cloud and it makes life so much easier and cleaner.

If you want to modify things like a signature, display settings, filters etc. then fiddle around in the settings area until you’re happy.

But you want to write emails while you’re offline? No problem, just download Google Gears. It downloads your last few month’s emails and allows you to compose emails even when you’re offline.

EDIT: The list was incredibly long, so I converted it into a cloud. Much nicer to look at.

Okay, fine… A – W. I’m working on some course material, and came across a document I created a while back. I’ve added to it and put it into alphabetical order for the sake of a glossary. It essentially covers every aspect you need to consider when creating a website.

Click on the image to see the large version.

I thought I’d share it with the world as this is a list of words relating to aspects of website creation needing to be considered, or at least communicated on most projects.

• Accessibility
• Admin
• AJAX
• Analytics
• Audio
• Bandwidth
• Blogs
• Brochure Web
• Browser Compatability
• Budget
• Browsers
• Bug Fixing
• Calendars
• Catalogue
• Checkout
• Colour
• Components
• Configurations
• Content Archiving
• Content Management Systems
• Cookies
• Copywriting
• Corporate Identity
• CSS
• Currencies
• Data Capture
• Data Management
• Databases
• Digital Products
• Documents
• Domain Names
• Ecommerce
• Electronic Invitations
• Email Accounts
• Feeds
• Flash Design
• Flash Programming
• Focal Points
• Fonts
• Forms
• Galleries
• Graphic Design
• HTML
• Image Manipulation
• Imagery
• Information Architecture
• Installations
• Interface
• Internationalisation
• Isolation
• JavaScript
• LAMP
• Layout
• Legal
• Link Building
• Localisation
• Logo
• Loop
• Maintenance
• Markup
• Mobile
• Multi Language
• Navigation
• Newsletters
• Online Marketing
• Pages
• Payment Gateways
• PDF
• Photography
• Platforms
• Printable Pages
• Privacy / Data Protection
• Production
• Products
• Programming
• Project Management
• Purpose of Website
• RSS
• Scheduled Publishing
• Scripts
• Search Engine Friendly
• Semantics
• Send to Friend
• SEO
• Servers
• Shipping
• Shopping Cart
• Site Features
• Sitemap
• Skinning
• SMS
• Social Networking
• Specification Document
• Spellcheck
• Storage Space
• Storyboard
• Streams
• Styling
• Subscription Form
• Syndication
• Tasks
• Technology
• Templates
• Testing
• Texture
• Theming
• Timeline
• Training
• Typography
• Usability
• User Rights
• Users
• Video
• Viral Campaigns
• Visitors
• Web Standards
• Whitespace
• Widgets
• Wiki
• Windows
• Wireframes
• Wishlists.

Feel free to suggest anything you think I’ve missed in the comments. But remember, we work almost exclusively in PHP and MySQL, so no need to mention any Microsoft related technologies .

Some light entertainment poking fun at Windows XP. Before anyone gets ants in their pants; I use Windows, have used Linux and intend to use a Mac in the near future, but on the whole, I am platform agnostic, so please don’t shoot me down in flames for insulting your precious Windows XP…

My first post since choosing not to write or publish content for anyone besides my clients, here is a videoblog of the rudimentary basics of content management systems. I illustrate through video how you can add pages and posts, as well as images and widgets to your website using the Wordpress publishing platform.

Please excuse the sound in the screencast. The mic jack on my laptop is not working for some reason.

The basics of content management from Ross Allchorn on Vimeo.

If you want a laugh, you can also view the bloopers (caution: strong language).

Aah blogging. Where do I start? A topic I swore never to write about in a blog post, but here we are and thats exactly what I’m doing. Effectively this will be the first and last time I blog about blogging, unless it’s of direct benefit to one of my clients.

I believe that the blogosphere in current day is becoming a jumbled mass of recycled information and top 10 (or 20 or 100) lists of the author’s interest, or sometimes not even something they’re interested in. Merely an opportunistic attempt at attracting traffic. A trend I find worrying and one that is starting to pollute the web with ultimately useless content.

There are blogs that are published with valuable content like Andy Rutledge’s Design View and many others, but the whole blogging concept is tainted in my eyes with all the garbage out there that really just doesn’t need to be published… anywhere!

Because of this I’ve decided I’m going to pack my blogging shoes away and opt towards writing only useful and informative articles instead. The title may be a little misleading here as I won’t stop writing on allchorn.com, but rather be making a conscious decision to put more time and effort into writing more valuable articles.

Big changes to follow here on allchorn.com early in 2009.